As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option available to users is information handling systems. An information handling system generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes thereby allowing users to take advantage of the value of the information. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements vary between different users or applications, information handling systems may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in information handling systems allow for information handling systems to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, information handling systems may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems.
Information handling systems often use an array of storage resources, such as a Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID), for example, for storing information. Arrays of storage resources typically utilize multiple disks to perform input and output operations and can be structured to provide redundancy which may increase fault tolerance. Other advantages of arrays of storage resources may be increased data integrity, throughput and/or capacity. In operation, one or more storage resources disposed in an array of storage resources may appear to an operating system as a single logical storage unit or “virtual resource.”
Implementations of storage resource arrays can range from a few storage resources disposed in a server chassis, to hundreds of storage resources disposed in one or more separate storage enclosures. As densities of storage resources making up storage arrays have increased, so has the power required for the storage resources making up such arrays, as well as the heat generated by the storage resources. Often, the temperatures of these storage resources need to be kept within a reasonable range to prevent overheating, instability, malfunction and damage leading to a shortened component lifespan. Accordingly, air movers (e.g., cooling fans and/or blowers) have often been used in storage enclosures to cool storage resources and other components within storage enclosures.
However, many existing approaches for thermal control in storage enclosures are energy-inefficient as compared to thermal control approaches used in information handling system servers. This occurs as a result of the fact that many storage enclosures have very limited processing power vis-à-vis that of servers. Storage enclosures may employ small, limited-purpose processors which are often built into or embedded into switching devices for routing traffic between information handling hosts and individual storage resources. Because of these limited processing capabilities, air mover control algorithms in storage enclosures may be more primitive than those in information handling system servers. Oftentimes, storage enclosures employ open-loop air mover control, meaning that air mover speed is set based on an ambient temperature of the environment proximate to or within the storage enclosure or based on a thermal sensor associated with a controller and/or switch for controlling routing of traffic in the storage enclosure. Thus, air mover speed is not set based on an actual thermal condition of the storage resources nor based on an actual power consumed or thermally dissipated by the storage resources.
Storage resources that may be used in a storage enclosure may have varying parameters (e.g., capacities, sizes, rotational speeds, etc.), meaning that various storage resources may consume vastly different amounts of power, sometimes varying by a factor of two or more. A designer of a thermal control system comprising one or more air movers may not be aware of the type of storage resources that may be placed within a storage enclosure, and thus must assume a “worst-case” scenario in implementing the thermal control system. Thus, as a temperature in or around a storage enclosure increases, it may be assumed that the thermal control system must cool the highest-power-consuming storage resources, and thus air mover speeds may be increased to meet the needs of the worst-case storage resource despite the fact that the storage enclosure may employ lower-power-consuming storage resources. The result may be storage enclosures that consume more air mover power than needed to achieve effective thermal control, generate more acoustic noise than if a more-power efficient approach were used, and/or that cost more to operate.
Accordingly, systems and methods may be desired allowing a storage controller to operate with open loop thermal control, while using thermal control approaches that are more closely tailored to the storage resources actually used by the system.